


Another Name

by stillgoldie1899



Category: Newsies (1992)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-19
Updated: 2017-11-20
Packaged: 2019-02-04 07:00:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12765627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stillgoldie1899/pseuds/stillgoldie1899
Summary: He wasn't who he thought he was, and the truth has far from set him free. Finding himself caught between those who would use him as a pawn, Jack turns the table on everyone who would try to use him- or at least, he tries to.





	1. Prologue - Leo - Jack - Medda

**Prologue**

The matter of who he was- who he presented himself to be, and who he was actually, hidden under layers of grime and grim, had seemed fairly clear, at least to him, for most of his life. There were those who saw through him, saw who he was, past his facade, past the bravado, it was true, and there were those who seemed to know to the heart of him, but at the end of the day, even they couldn't have known the truth of him. Because he didn't either.

When Medda told him, the winter after the strike, the whole of the story, it had shaken him, all but broke him. His whole life, all the sorrows and struggle and anger at the injustice of the world were only partially his, suddenly. The mother he loved, the mother he watched die, wasn't his. And the mother who was, had handed him away, content to be a friend of his father's in exchange for a career. Medda Larkson, Gretchen Kline, whoever she really was, had given birth to him, the product of an affair, and then she handed him away to John Sullivan without a thought to where she was leaving her child, and without a word to his father. Harold Warren hadn't known at the time, and Jack was never told, and John took the lie to prison. And now one father was dead, the other in jail. One mother dead, the other a stranger. And the hollowness of it all threatened to tear him apart.

But Medda, ever the actress, ever self-serving, had only told Jack when it suited her. And it suited her to tell him because it had finally suited her to tell her former lover, as he wasted away in his final illness. An old man, sick, and filled with the nostalgia of better days, of his Meadow Lark, who had filled his home with song and laughter when his wife had died, and who had flitted away from him and he'd never known why. When he found out, when she finally told him, he was sick to know his son had been raised half on the street, made her promise to tell him the truth, and added the boy to his will, to the frustration of his only other, legitimate, son, Leopold. 

And though she promised, Medda only told Jack because the money was his, and she would only get close to it through him.

What she hadn't properly counted on was that she'd given her son to a man who's whole life was a con. John Sullivan had, by his actions, and by design, had raised his boy to be just like him. And while John Sullivan was not Jack's father, he had succeeded. As much as Medda could not be trusted, neither could he. And now? Suddenly, the game had changed, completely.

**Chapter 1.**

_Leo Warren_

The newspaper was discarded to the side of his desk, forgotten as he glowered at the paperwork the lawyer had sent over, which had arrived shortly after. Unfortunately, it seemed everything was proper and in order, and while he would love to argue that his father had been witless when he made the changes to his will, everything was holding up. He was being forced to share with the dance hall harlot's son. The scruffy little street rat had even had the gall to show up to the funeral the day before, standing at a respectful distance, blessedly without his mother in tow. 

He remembered the woman, though he'd been all but 13 or so when she'd slowly become a fixture in his father's house. He'd been back and forth between school and home, and her presence, so soon after the death of his mother, had been jarring for him. He'd been almost gleeful when she was abruptly gone, assuming his father had finally come to his senses. But that had, apparently, not quite been the case. And now he was being forced to deal with a problem that should really have been handled much sooner. If it had, he might not be in the predicament he was currently in.

He needed the money. All of it. And the fact that some of it was going to a brat criminal whose mother ran a vaudeville hall where most of that money was likely to end up rankled him. He needed to somehow divert it, get the kid on side, and away from his mother, and he had no idea how he was going to manage it. 

His club, the private club he owned and managed, needed renovations and updates, and an expanded staff wouldn't hurt, and he already owed money on the work that was currently under way. He could have tried to get investors elsewhere, but after having dismissed the offers of several of the members, he was in a somewhat delicate position. He was even willing to take the kid on as a partner, share in some of the eventual profit, if it meant saving face. But the Golden Cat was a hard sell, next to the tacky, gaudy Irving Hall. At least, on the outside it was. The inside...that was another matter, and until he had a better sense of the kid, he wouldn't be getting anywhere near the inside.

Standing, he straightened the papers the lawyer had sent, and locked them in his desk, the newspaper folded under his arm as he headed for the door- when in doubt, ask the advice of the woman who ran the staff at the Cat. If anyone could sort out how to get gutter trash to invest his sudden wealth in the club, it was Rayna.

_Jack Kelly_

Suddenly being left a substantial sum of money by the father he had never had the chance to even meet hadn't actually changed his life drastically- he'd made a point of not telling the guys, even keeping it from Sarah and David, not wanting it to throw everything sideways. Of course, everything was sideways already, but he didn't want to deal with that quite yet. Because he knew the moment he actually faced it, everything would change.

Medda wanted him to come work for her, at Irving Hall. She'd rambled on a bit, the last time he'd seen her, something about helping her manage the place, wanting to teach him how the business worked. And that was too much like being shackled, trapped in one place, for him to handle. It would mean spending every day, day in and day out, doing the exact same thing. Selling papes wasn't exactly the easiest job ever, but he could wander if he wanted. He made his own rules, did his own thing. And working for Medda would not look like that.

And there was the matter of her lies, as well. The fact she'd kept the truth from him for so long. He didn't trust her, anymore, and he was smart enough to know that if Medda had wanted him around from the start, she would have said something sooner. She'd only spoken up when he came into money, and was clearly just after that windfall. He wasn't stupid. But he also knew that he was trapped between Medda and the family his father had left behind- his legitimate son, who Jack had only seen the once, and had never spoken to. He had met the man's lawyer, who had tracked him down a few days earlier, and had signed the things the man had wanted him to sign, but he'd never spoken to his half-brother. 

He'd heard about him, though. A few dark whispers here and there. The Warrens were a banking family, and Leo had been acting president of the bank for years when Harold Warren died. But it wasn't the bank that people whispered about, it was the club. He owned and managed a private club, one that was said to be a little more than the usual place for gentlemen members to gather and drink and play cards. One of the girl he knew, from the neighborhood, had been inside once, or so she said. He taken her wild stories with a grain of salt, but that was before he'd been related to the owner. Now, he wasn't so sure.

So, frankly, he didn't trust either of them, Medda or his half-brother, and if he could, he'd be tempted to take his part of the money, propose to Sarah, and buy a ranch to live on with her, in Santa Fe. It was just that he didn't know how to actually do that- either getting his hands on the money, or proposing to Sarah. And he didn't have anyone he could ask, either, about either thing.

_Medda Larkson_

Some people just weren't meant to be mothers. It was something she told herself, repeatedly, over the last 17 years, something she tried to comfort herself with. She couldn't have been a mother, unmarried, unprepared. John and Ada having lost their son in the months before she gave birth to Francis had been a blessing, and she was convinced that Ada's subsequently giving birth to a daughter, when Frank was 2, wouldn't have happened if she hadn't given the woman her son to raise.

And it wasn't as though she didn't keep an eye on the boy. Because she had, for the most part. Yes, there were whole chunks of Frank's life she'd lost, whole bits where she was too busy, and he wasn't around. But she had done what she could, well above and beyond what he might have expected of her, as simply a friend of his father's. And now? Now the boy owed her. 

She'd given him a name. A real name. Francis Warren. Another moniker for the boy to adopt, another persona for him to evolve into- the youngest and until recently unknown son of a well-to-do family, and it was her doing. She had given this thing to him, and he owed her. He owed her for everything he was.

The problem was that she didn't trust him. When he was just Jack Kelly, she didn't mind that he was everything John Sullivan had been in his youth- charming and handsome and completely useless. She might have married John, if he hadn't found Ada first, and in hindsight, giving the man her son had been, perhaps, a poor move. But it had been a choice between John and Ada and an church doorstep, if she was being entirely honest, and only one had given her the chance to keep an eye on the kid. 

But in giving her son to a man she knew to be a criminal, she was left with a criminal for a son. It was going to take work, to get him to where she needed him to be, and she knew she was going to have to lure him in. If he wasn't already so smitten with that Jacobs girl, she would have set one or two of her dancers on him, and she still might- she knew his head turned for any pretty girl. There was a difference, however, in a turned head, and a completely distracted young man, and with the girlfriend in the picture...

First step, however, was getting him to actually talk to her about everything. She had been hoping he'd seek her out, perhaps after the funeral. But he hadn't, and it was starting to seem like she would have to go to him.


	2. Rayna

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leo and Rayna begin to craft a plan to lure Jack away from Irving Hall, and Medda's sphere of influence.

                                                                                          _Rayna Gildstein_

Old Mr Warren being dead was supposed to fix things. A great number of things, if truth be told, needed to be addressed- she had lists, if the younger Mr Warren were to ask her for her opinion. But it seemed the newcomer on the scene was mucking up the works, and that didn't bode well for herself, or her staff.

It wasn't necessarily something the rest of the staff needed to know, of course. Not yet- let them think things would be changing. Workmen had already come and done a few things, new paper on the walls in the rooms upstairs, new curtains, a touch of paint. But she knew the extent of it. They were understaffed, and close to shutting down. And she knew that if Golden Cat closed, all of them would be on their asses.

It was motivation for her to seek her boss out, before he could come find her, when she heard he'd shown up and had disappeared into his office. It was early morning, and most of the staff was still abed, but she didn't sleep very much, and Leo knew it, evidenced by the complete lack of surprise in his voice when she knocked on the door, letting herself in with a sigh.

                    **“** Have you heard anything from the boy? Have you spoken to him? **”** The questions should have been simple, if somewhat blunt, and she'd forgone formalities to get to the point, a trait she knew her employer appreciated.

                              **“**  No. I need an appropriate plan of attack before I bother. I was actually hoping I might get your input on the subject. Have a seat. **”** Leo Warren was a handsome man, in his way, although Rayna had seen the ugly side of him, more than once. Violence was second nature to the man, as much as it was to her, kindred spirits with a taste for force and aggression. But she had also had occasion to see him softer, and it sometimes colored the way she saw him, tall and lean, dark of hair and dark of eye. And, as always, dressed precisely to a t.

                    **“**  A plan of attack. You make it sound like war, Mr Warren. **”** She settled across from him, languidly seated, legs crossed, draped a bit over one leather clad chair arm, keeping up an air of casual  interest, although she was almost buzzing with it.

                              **“**  It is a war, Rayna. That redheaded harlot, over at Irving Hall, has maneuvered herself into a position to take everything her gutter rat son managed to get out of my father. Money that should be mine, by right. That I should be free to invest, as I see fit. This woman has insulted me, and my family, as has her son, and it is war. I simply need to define what my weapons are before I engage them. **”**

Her lips curled a little as he spoke, until she was all but grinning, a dark and somewhat dangerous expression on her face.  **“** And so war it is. Tell me what you know about the boy. **”**

                              **“**  He was part of that rabble of newboys that went on strike against the World last summer. He's a criminal, a thief. He's spent time in the Boys House of Refuge. His adopted mother of a wasting illness when he was young, his adopted father is in prison. And he's attached himself a bit to a family, down in Little Germany. Whispers that the daughter is his sweetheart, the son his best friend, who had dropped out of school to help support his family. **”** Leo's expression was far less amused, as he leaned back in his chair, spitting facts about his half-brother out through almost gritted teeth. And at every word, he seemed more and more annoyed.

_It amused her._

                    **“**  Well, the easy answer is to get to him through the family. Offer them...something. Work. Not here, but at the bank, perhaps? Is the father any kind of competent? And is the girl any kind of pretty? **”** The last question led more to the harder answer to the overall conundrum.  **“** Because if she's not...there are more than a few young ladies here who might turn his head. If his head is the type to be turned. And while I suspect the same is true at Irving Hall, our girls have an advantage over the dancer there. Skill, namely. And experience. **”**

Leo sighed, rubbing at his forehead, obviously frustrated, in addition to annoyed.  **“** I know nothing of the father. I should...have that looked into. Wise advice. If nothing else, it would buy me a little good will, I suspect. I need his good will to start with. **”**

                    **“**  Have you considered...bringing him here? Or offering to let him come? We can put on quite a show, you know, and I'm absolutely certain most of the members would find it terribly amusing to come meet this brother of yours. Your wife's brother, for instance? If Ash can be trusted. Mr Williams, Mr Moore. Perhaps even the good Reverend might make an appearance. And I can dress the staff up. Teddy would be on board, I'm sure. He loves any excuse for a party. And we simply...let him see what money can afford him. What this place can afford him. Let him bring some of his friends, even, why not? This boy from Little Germany, especially. Endear them all to us, to the finer things. Let them see something beyond that tack little theatre, and the woman who runs it. There is more to the world than that. Let them see. **”** She paused, for a long moment, one eyebrow just arching slightly, before she added,  **“** Just an idea. **”**

                              **“**  We can't really afford... **”** His voice trailed off a little as Leo sighed, settling back in his chair again, head tilted.  **“** It doesn't have to be grand. Just the illusion. We can afford that much. You're right. That is the way. **”**

                    **“**  Send him a suit, with the invitation. And one for the friend. Worst that can happen? He sells it and doesn't come. And then we know, it really is a war. **”**

                              **“**  This is why I pay you so damned well. **”** The lighter expression, almost a smirk, was a welcome sight after his glowering, and Rayna moved to stand, brushing idly at her skirts.

                    **“**  It is, indeed. I'll go wake a few of the staff to start organizing what we'll need. Two days time, shall we say? I'll take care of everything here, you just bring the guest of honor. **”** With just the slightest curtsy, she slipped from the room, already considering how she was going to organize a large party without a budget, wondering if the other manager was awake yet- she was going to need Teddy's help to pull this one off.


End file.
